


Happy to go blind

by Dispatches (orphan_account)



Category: Sunshine (2007)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-05-11
Updated: 2010-05-11
Packaged: 2017-10-09 10:06:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/86016
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Dispatches
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Capa dreams.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Happy to go blind

1

Capa dreams.

He's walking on the ice in Sydney Harbour when the sun comes up, and it's not the pale, weak sun that he's had to get used to; it's the sun he remembers from his childhood, fierce and bright and blinding. Joy bursts in his chest like a heart attack and he starts to run, east, east, towards the light, towards the warmth, whooping and yelling and waving his arms.

As he runs stray thoughts worm their way through the joy

_why haven't I slipped on the ice? didn't the _Icarus_ disappear? what am I doing in Sydney?_

and he pushes them down, ignores them because this, this sunrise, this is what he was born for. He knows

_how?_

that he has created it, that he is the first human being in the history of Earth to make the sun rise.

He opens his mouth to shout _I made the sun rise!_ but his voice makes no sound, and that's when he notices that the ice is shuddering beneath him. There are cracks running through it, starting at his feet and working outwards, and _of course! It's breaking, of course: the sun is melting it_, and that's good, but he doesn't want to sink, doesn't want to drown, so he runs

_what's that noise?_

runs east, to the sun, to the sunrise -- his eyes are open, he is staring at the sun -- he can outrun the ice, he knows this

_ **how?** _

if he can run fast enough, he'll collide with the light and the sun will embrace him, lift him up from the earth

_Capa?_

run, run, run, faster, the ice is breaking, _run_

"CAPA!"

He jerks awake. There's a creaking coming from somewhere above him and Kaneda's voice on the comm by his ear.

"Capa, you there? We need you to check the course, see if it needs correcting."

Capa sits up and rubs at his neck. He fell asleep at an angle and it's going to ache for a while. "Be with you in a minute, Captain."

The floor is warm and solid under his feet.

 

2

They stuck to old habits for longer than Capa'd thought they would. Six weeks out and he still got dressed properly before leaving his bunk, still shaved every morning -- still called them "mornings", even though there were no sunsets and no sunrises and no noons, neither the blazing noons he remembered from before nor the noons of the dying sun, with shadows that were short and soft and barely visible.

Once every seven days he had a session with Searle. Searle asked him about his sleep cycle, his appetite, how he was getting on with the others, all as if Searle wasn't on the ship with them watching their every move.

"You don't have to ask me," he said once, ten weeks out. "You were there. You know what happened."

"But I don't know how you felt about it," said Searle.

"It doesn't matter," said Capa. "It was just a little spat."

"Small conflicts can grow. You know that, Capa. We're all stuck here, together, until we deliver the payload. We have to get along, and it's my job to make sure that we do."

Capa leaned back and closed his eyes. "Really, it was nothing. Mace and I are fine. I just got a little irritated because I -- " He stops himself. "Because I didn't sleep very well."

"Dreams?"

Capa opened his eyes. "No," he said, licking his lips.

Searle smiled. "All right. If you don't want to tell me, that's all right. But if they start interfering with your sleep -- I mean, in a serious way -- tell me. I have sedatives, programs for the Earthroom -- I can help."

"I don't remember my dreams," said Capa.

 

3

Four months out, the unit that heats their washing water breaks down. Icarus doesn't detect the malfunction until after Capa's stepped into the shower and drenched himself with freezing cold water. His teeth are chattering as he leaps out, turns the water off, and rubs himself down with a towel worn smooth from use.

"Ic-Icarus, report on water heater status."

There's a pause, then Icarus replies: "_Water heater malfunction detected. Manual repairs required. Are you all right, Capa?_"

His heart is pounding and his arms and legs are all over gooseflesh. "I'm f-- I'm fine, Icarus. Tell Corazon about the water heater."

By unspoken agreement, they don't page each other directly from the bathrooms; otherwise, they'd never have any privacy at all. Icarus is watching but Icarus is always watching and Icarus never tells.

He sits down and rubs himself all over until he is dry and then rubs himself all over until the gooseflesh is gone. He wants to be warm. More than anything, he wants to be warm.

Ten minutes later, Icarus speaks. "_Water heater repaired. All systems functioning. You can finish your shower now, Capa._"

"Thanks, Icarus," says Capa, though the thought of letting water touch his skin is repulsive now. He steps into the shower and takes breaths, deep ones, like he used to take before diving into a swimming pool, back before things like swimming pools became unreasonable luxuries, when water was something you drowned in and not something you walked on.

He presses the knob and the water that falls on him is hot enough to bring a flush to his skin, and it's still not quite enough.

 

4

Six months out, they all gave up the pretence that their sessions with Searle were confidential and just talked to him wherever they both happened to be, no matter who could overhear. Capa heard Trey talking to him in the kitchen one sleep-cycle (they'd stopped calling them nights) when he woke up from a dream of falling with sweaty palms and a terrible thirst.

"...doesn't respect me, and it's really getting on my nerves."

"Your reaction was unreasonable. You have to see that."

Capa poured himself a glass of water and drank slowly. Trey'd seemed just as confident as the rest of them during training, but in the first few weeks out from Earth, factions had begun to form, little cliques of friends closer to each other than to anyone else, and Trey hadn't been part of any of them. Nobody had set out to exclude him, and when they realised what had happened they'd made some effort to open up, but it hadn't stopped Trey from feeling second-rate, like he wasn't really part of the crew.

"I'm just as qualified as everyone here, and I do a good job!"

"Yes, and Harvey knows that. He wasn't trying to disrespect you, just suggesting that a little more care might be warranted as we get closer to the sun."

"We're not much closer now than we were yesterday. Why does he pick today to nag me?"

Capa put his glass in the cleaning unit and walked back to his quarters as quietly as he could. Harvey was a dick, and Trey couldn't handle him, and Searle wasn't being helpful; it had happened before and it would happen again.

When he closed his eyes, he dreamed of water.

 

5

Capa doesn't tell anyone about his dreams and nobody tells him about theirs, but somehow he knows anyway. Corazon dreams of lush gardens and rainforests, hot and misty and squirming with life. Mace dreams of waves rushing in to the shore. Searle dreams of windows that open on to more windows that open on to more windows.

Starting at eight months out, Cassie dreams of the sun. He can see it in her eyes when she talks (as she seldom does) about the mission. She dreams of the sun, of the final surge from Icarus, dreams of being pulled in by its gravitational field. She dreams of falling into that light and heat and being consumed, and it is a happy dream.

Capa envies her. He starts spending more time with her, hoping that whatever it is that lets her dream this way will rub off on him. He even makes a pass, late one sleep-cycle, and she smiles at him before brushing him off.

"We can't do this," she says. "We have to stay on this ship for another two years. So many things could happen. We have to get along with each other."

"I know. It was -- "

"We can't let this be a problem. And it will be, even if you and I are fine with it."

Capa nods and shifts away from her. Six men and two women in a little tin can for thirty-two months, all going well; there couldn't be pairings or assignations, it would drive the others crazy. If anyone went without, everyone went without. It was the only way to make sure they didn't all kill each other.

"You're sure it's going to be two years," he says after an awkward pause: not a question.

"You're not?"

"Like you say. So many things could happen."

"Capa!" She sounds shocked. She touches his face, turns it so he can't help but look at her and see the sunlight in her eyes. "We're going to do it. We're going to succeed."

"But how can you -- "

"Because we have to! We're the last hope. We don't have a choice." She lets her hand drop but still holds onto him with her eyes. "If you're having doubts, you should talk to Searle."

"I'm not having -- I've done the calculations, Cassie! I've run the models over and over, and there comes a point where we _just don't know_. This is a last-ditch mission and we have no way of knowing if it's going to work. Even if everything goes right."

Cassie stares at him. "Then we'll just have to have faith."

She gets up and walks away, and Capa stares at his hands and wonders. Maybe everything went right for the _Icarus I_. Maybe their mission failed anyway. Maybe that's why they never came back to Earth: they couldn't stand the shame of having once been the world's best hope.

Maybe the sun will never rise again.

 

6

Capa ran the simulations over and over and over again, in his head and with the help of the computers, and the result was always the same: up to a point there was near-certainty, and beyond that point, nothing. A sudden influx of unpredictable variables that left him floundering in the dark.

Two cycles after he'd talked to Cassie, he went to the observation deck alone for the first time and stared at the sun with the filter at 0.1%, then 0.2%, then 0.3%, right up until Icarus was warning him that a further decrease in filtering would result in permanent retinal damage. He closed his eyes, then, and let the heat soak into muscles he hadn't realised were aching.

He ran into Searle on his way back to his quarters. "Sunbathing?" said Searle with a grin.

Capa touched his face. It felt hot, and the skin was beginning to peel. "That was stupid. I didn't think -- I mean, it didn't occur to me -- "

Searle's grin subsided. "No, well. It's been a long time since anyone's gotten sunburned on Earth." He patted Capa on the shoulder. "It looks good on you."

Capa smiled, uncertain. "Uh. Thanks."

 

7

Nine months out, Capa dreams of being born. He is floating in cold dark water that cramps and confines him, and then comes a rush and a push and he is born, he is free, he is

\-- he is _falling_ \--

\-- towards the light --

\-- towards the sun --

\-- and the sun is ready for him, the sun is _catching_ him, and there is no darkness, and there is no cold, there is only light and heat and it surrounds him and it buoys him up and it _consumes_ him --

\-- and when his eyes finally open it is as if he has closed them.

The room is bright because Icarus turns the lights on automatically when he opens his eyes, the delay so brief that his conscious mind cannot register it, but. This is not brightness. This is not light.

Capa pads barefooted to the observation deck and stares at the sun with the filters at 2%. He thinks he understands, now, why Cassie has the sun in her eyes, why Searle always seems to be looking somewhere else. Why the others don't fear failure as he does.

He thinks maybe he should say something, a vow or a prayer, but he's never been religious and the words won't come. He stands up before the filter and bows, once, then leaves the observation deck.

He doesn't think he'll go there alone again.

[end]


End file.
